


between rage and serenity (is humanity and your name)

by zerotransfat



Category: The Song of Achilles - Madeline Miller
Genre: Angst, Happy Ending, Having Faith, In which humanity is much better than the gods give them credit for, M/M, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-08
Updated: 2018-01-08
Packaged: 2019-03-02 02:11:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13308195
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zerotransfat/pseuds/zerotransfat
Summary: Pyrrhus may have ground his father’s last wishes under his heel, but it does not mean others do not remember.The Fates are cruel, but Mankind has more in them than pettiness and rage; bit by bit, through kindness and believing in the little lies, a wandering soul is brought home— not by the capricious mercy of a goddess, but by humanity’s capacity for compassion.(It is not only by Thetis's hand that Patroclus's name is carved.)





	between rage and serenity (is humanity and your name)

**Author's Note:**

> **Arrives to the fandom over half a decade late (or centuries, depending on when you start) with Starbucks, tears rolling into the coffee** : Yeah so like I had this book on the backburner and then I read it and now I’m a mess whassup homies

The first to leave her version of the story on the marble tomb is Briseis. Of course it is Briseis, she who knew more about the two than anyone else. Of course it is she, for a love that burns still in the bottom-most depths of her heart for the best of Myrmidons.

That night, she silently creeps out from her tent and makes her way to the carved stele, and gazes upon the deeds cast in stone. They are a little hastily done, but clear enough. Achilles killing Memnon, killing Hector, killing Penthesilea. Nothing but death. On the stone it says A C H I L L E S, and nothing more. The blank space makes her heart ache. There is no mention, no hint of a most singular, kind man. No record of tanned skin on fair, no remanent of the sound of the lyre and two voices. No indication that despite the lonely name, _two_ were interred in the same tomb.

She cannot bear that. She has borne much, but this...this she cannot condone.

She drags the sharp tip of a rock across a bit of blank space, brow furrowed in concentration as she works. With quick strokes, she sketches two hands, fingers interlaced, in-between yet another war scene. Just two hands, almost hidden by the stone spears and rearing horses and carnage. Hard to find unless one looked closely.

Briseis is unfamiliar with the strange curves and dashes of Greek and thus cannot write that beloved name, but this she can do. It is insignificant, in the face of all that has occurred, just clumsy scratches on immaculate marble, perhaps incomprehensible to anyone who doesn’t know the truth.

But she knows. She pauses a moment to look at her work— a bit of love, in the middle of death. Just a tiny fragment, stretched across ten years. Still, it is beautiful.

Some distance away, lamplight flickers. She cannot linger for much longer.

Briseis reaches out and brushes the two hands for a second. “I do not have faith in your gods,” she whispers, “but I’m sure you will find your way back to him. This much I can do for you.”

The next night, as she sinks into the dark sea with Pyrrhus’s spear through her chest, numbness spreading (a mercy), she smiles. Despite all the brat’s posturing, she knows on that marble there is something of the best man she has known.

Not all names are written in words.

 

* * *

 

The second is Odysseus. Despite all that he is a consummate politician, cunning Odysseus knows something of love.

He comes forward the night before they set sail and entreats Pyrrhus to respect Achilles’s last wish, but it is in vain. The fiery-haired youth responds with words sharper than knives, and deep in his heart Odysseus knows it is a lost cause.

He stares into the prince’s implacable face, and sighs. “I have done my best,” he says. “Let it be remembered I tried.”

Without another word, he turns and leaves the tent, and sighs once more into the night. An errant thought turns his footsteps towards Achilles’s tomb.

He takes his dagger, and with a furtive glance scans the surroundings, makes sure there are no prying eyes.

He looks at the stele, and sees, with sharp eyes, a few scratches; if he squints he can see that it is meant to be a pair of hands, and in his mind an idea forms. Odysseus sets his knife point-first into the marble beside the crude engraving, and with great care scratches _μεγαλήτωρ_ into it as best he can. It is a common enough epithet, “great-hearted”, but Odysseus thinks of the pair of young men he first met so long ago now, and it is more than appropriate for the both of them.

“I am sorry that I cannot do more— I owe you much. But this, this I can do.” He says, perhaps to the shade of the unnamed man buried there, perhaps to Achilles, most likely to himself.

The thought takes hold of him for a long while, and adds to the bittersweet even as the ruins of Troy disappear far into the horizon. _This and this and this, but this I can do._

 

* * *

 

One by one or in small groups, they come. There is no numbering them, after some time.

People come to see his grave, the great memorial of Achilles Pelides. Some hang back, as if they are afraid his ghost will rise and challenge them. Others stand at the base to look at the scenes of his life carved on the stone. Yet others gather together, and someone—after a while, it doesn’t matter who does— starts telling tales. Grains of truth, wrapped with the little lies that humanity requires as much as air and water and bread, for without them humanity would not exist.

Old men with arrow scars, children playing make believe, young couples whispering sweet promises. They trace their fingers over the carvings of love in-between bloodshed and savagery, and they talk about bravery and gentleness instead. They take up shards of rock and knives and skilled chisels, and add their own variations on a single name, a single soul. Thus, they are honoured, in ways that only people can do.  _This, only I can do._

“I will love you like how Achilles did his _philtatos_ ,” the young ones whisper. “I will love you forever, even in strife and war.”

In truth, there is little these people can do. They cannot carve the name proper onto the memorial, they can do nothing but sing songs and add whimsical additions to the tales of martial prowess already immortalized in stone.

(What did I tell you about the little lies?)

But it serves its purpose. His name is still spoken, and so he has not faded. Human memory, while not always reliable, still echoes long after life has left cold bones, and lingering on so many tongues it grows and grows.

Love, that most enticing of little lies, resonates most of all.

Perhaps it is those echoes that finally leads Thetis to the hill where her son is buried; perhaps it calls to her maternal instinct. But whatever the case, she arrives to mortals still singing the song of Achilles and his most beloved, flowers growing around the marble stele.

The shade she meets there is all but already gone, and with a soft sigh she engraves the necessary name onto the stone. To be fair, it is only a formality at this point; his name has already been carved and honoured more times than one can count, in so many different hands and on so many tongues.

The last whisp shares with her a single memory—Achilles, grinning as the figs blur in his hands. His green eyes laughing into his.  _Catch,_ he says. Achilles, outlined against the sky, hanging from a branch over the river. The thick warmth of his sleepy breath against his ear. _If you have to go, I will go with you._

She simply nods, understanding that this will be the closest thing she will have to closure. "Go. He waits for you." Without another word, the shade is gone, speeding towards a place where she cannot go, towards a son that will never be immortal.

Thetis listens to the sound of the waves, alone, staring into the grain of the stone. ACHILLES, it reads. And beside it, PATROCLUS. Like it had been engraved there since the beginning.

She takes a step back to take in the entire obelisk. She sees the scenes of death, of taking lives and crushing them, but between the margins there is life and love and laughter. She sees a pair of hands, fingers interlaced in the bright light, holding tight, forever.

(Perhaps gods devour mortals raw to get a taste of the little lies, the ones that make living worth it. They'll never admit it out loud, but here she is staring up at her son's tomb, wondering for just a second.)

 

* * *

 

_In the darkness, a shadow wakes. His lover leans over him, his golden hair blazing through the gloom and hopelessness. Their hands are together, fingers already interlaced. He smiles up at him, his other hand reaching up to brush at that cheek._

_"Finally, you're awake." The lovers smile at each other, and still hand in hand, they walk away from the rivershore._

_Together, the light overpowers the morning sun._

 

**Author's Note:**

> many thanks to this book for destroying me, and for discworld for supplying the "little lies" concept. I blame Hogfather but Christmas is already over, what the heck is with these crossed wires
> 
> also i'm pretty sure i got a lot of things wrong, don't hesitate to lay it on me
> 
> But anyways this is all I've got, i'm well aware this is a mess but bear with me i got this idea at 4:45 am


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